Fjørdgasm: Norway on the half shell

You may have noticed the Norwegian coastline is crinklier than a pine cone. That's why we have fjords, which is kind of the attraction in the first place, but that also means you'll frequently need to get across those things. That brings us to the subject of ferries , which will feature prominently in your plans. As we're about to embark on the mother of Norwegian ferry crossings, this is as good a time as any to step back and demystify the topic a bit. Recap: It's June 29, 2019, and we're about cross over to the Lofoten islands, fabled and, for me, saturated in memories and sentimental value. To get there coming from the south, you have three options — the long ferry crossing from Bodø to Moskenes , a shorter ferry crossing from Bognes to Lødingen , or simply driving. The islands are connected to the mainland and each other now, so unless you're sick of driving at this point you don't have to get on the water at all. I opted for the Bo

The keen eye will notice a subtle difference in vegetation when you come down from Saltfjellet heading north: Norway spruce never made it past this barrier, and from here on up it's pine and birch forests. Could be that subliminal change in your surroundings, or could be a product of the mind, but to me at least the landscape seems more wild, tougher now. The dense and soft spruce forests that cover so much of the lower parts of the country are gone, replaced now by forests a bit thinner, a bit more leggy and weathered. We book it to Saltstraumen , just outside Bodø, where our accommodations for the night await. That turns out to be a camper — the campground owner's personal camper, in fact, which he's decided to rent out when he's not using it. Demand is high. Saltstraumen is an in-demand destination: One, because it's an impressive sight — a massive current produced by the tides squeezing most the water in Skjerstad Fjord in and out through the

Saltfjellet , literally “Salt Mountain” for some reason, for me always marked the transition to north Norway — Nord-Norge . That's not technically accurate * , but I'm reliving the past, dammit, so what matters is my gut feel. We, my sister and I, would be cocooned in the back seat of our dad's Citroën CX Athena, cushioned by the willowy French hydro-pneumatic suspension in nests made of sleeping bags and pillows, with our coloring books and whatever else, besides bickering, we passed the time with before the Internet. Once we passed Mo i Rana and started climbing to the raw, barren mountain plateaus of Saltfjellet, the trip changed for me. We were there . Also not technically accurate, seeing as we still have a good couple of hours to go before we reach Bodø, but, again, close enough. We'd usually have taken three days getting there, so for all practical purposes this was the home stretch. Today, fortyish years later, Saltfjellet is in a grim mood. A

Having gotten rid of our tents, with prejudice, after our miserable night at Torghatten , we face a problem: My (in hindsight optimistic) plan was to camp for the night outside Bodø and then again in Lofoten. The White Whale is floating us comfortably, satiated and happy courtesy of Trixie , along the E6 towards Saltfjellet and the Arctic Circle. This stretch is a welcome relief after days spent on narrow ribbons of asphalt strung between frigid water on one side and jagged rock faces on the other: Comofortably wide and relatively straight. It's also familiar. As a kid, on my family's many trips up north, it meant we were closing in on the mountain crossing at Saltfjellet, which in turn meant we were getting close to our destination. So also now; I can practically smell Lofoten. Right now, however, I have accommodations to drum up, or we're spending the next three days sleeping in the car. There's not that much to gawk at on this stretch, unless you haven't

Trixie saved our lives. Or, at least, our sanity. Some time around one, the whole bedraggled crew is stuffing itself, warm and cozy, from a table covered in food: Pizza, fries, and shawarma at Trixie Kebab and Pizza in tiny Trofors. Trofors is actually a pleasant place with an awesome waterfall, but we're not paying attention to anything right now because we're hungry, tired, and pissed. We'd left Torghatten cold, hungry, and demoralized that morning. The only one who didn't have a miserable night was Mia, whose superpower is sleeping right through whatever misery nature throws at her. As for the rest of us … The kids' tent turned out to be leaky, and they'd shivered through the night in moist sleeping bags. Ours, the lightproof wonder we'd been so excited about, was not advertised as windproof . Come to find out why all the other campers we've seen use these little mountaineering tubelike things: All night, the wind grabbed big fistfulls of tend and

The hole in Torghatten isn't the cute little pinhole at all that you see on postcards and tourism sites. Once you get up there you'll find it's a cavern. In contrast to the rounded shape of the mountain it pierces, it's all ragged edges and looks as if it were hammered out in a fit of massive troll violence. It's a cold, blustery day out there. We're about to have a miserable night and curse our tent to Hell, but we don't know that yet. Mia is bundled up in weatherproof bibs and a raincoat and isn't fazed at all. Our first setback was when we arrived at the campground and found out I was wrong: They don't have pots and pans. Kitchen, yes, but nothing to cook with. We'd decided to save space and not bring any because I was convinced campground kitchens would have at least something, just like the cabins do. Nope. They were none to friendly about it, either. The only campground out there at the mountain is also a high-end r